It's been years since I used an 18" low but with a 40-50 lb load in 4 panniers climbing over Massanutten Mountain in that 18" I was making better than 2 mph, and you can bet that pushing that bike up that steep grade I couldn't have made anything like the speed I was going. But, as I say, that was years ago.
These days my lowest gear is usually 22", and on a long steep mountain grade I'm usually making around 3.5 mph using it. (I had opportunity at Bike Virginia a week ago to take note of this, going up what they called "Caldwell Mountain".) I barely make 3.5 mph walking on level ground, not pushing a bike. I can't push a bike up a steep hill at anything remotely like 3.5 mph. On Caldwell Mountain at 3.5 mph it looked as though was going twice as fast as the people who were walking up the hill. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Matthew J" <matthewj...@gmail.com> To: rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com Sent: Friday, July 5, 2013 10:40:08 AM Subject: [RBW] Re: IGH on a touring bike? > Personally I can't stand spinning a 20" low gear up some steep hill at 2 mph. > I'd rather walk. Same here. Believe the evidence is clearly in on the Rohloff for long distance and rough stuff touring. Mine was quite a robust piece of work. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
